Elise Randolph wrote:That sounds good, but the actions of SCL don't really line up with this "meta-preserving" message. I mean no team can adapt to Tinker setups in the SCL because Tinker teams were deemed Not Fun To Watch by the SCL and have been hard-banned as a result. Especially ironic since the Tinker, which has essentially become one of the few core tournament archetypes, was one of the ways we saw Drone-based teams countered. Teams that did well in SCL knew perfectly well how to get around Tinkers in ATXI as a direct result of their involvement and some teams even toyed with Tinker-Control crossovers. But now...not so much.
I will continue to participate in SCL because it's a fun thing to do, but after canceling SCL 4 with 3 days notice and implementing a draconian archetype banning policy, it is becoming more clear that SCL is very far removed from "Eve Tournament prep"
First, the serious answer as an SCL representative:
As you know, SCL4 will be taking place on Sisi, which almost certainly will have Odyssey 1.1 mechanics. Odyssey 1.1 will include significant changes to the strength of tanking ganglinks, as well as significant buffs to local armor tanking. Given these changes, we were not 100% confident of how the Tinker meta would change; we felt that it was a safer choice to ban it for SCL4, in case Tinkers became significantly overpowered as a result of the local tank changes.
If it turns out that energy transfer Tinkers are not overpowered in Odyssey 1.1, we will consider allowing them again for SCL5.
(FWIW, I personally think that 1.1 in its current form will be a nerf to Tinkers. But, 1.1 is not yet set in stone, and banning them was the safe choice for today.)
Furthermore, Tinkers can technically be built with nos instead of energy transfers. (Since your team fielded a nos-based tinker in the Fanfest PvP tournament, I'm sure that you're already aware of its strengths and weaknesses.) That meta is still available to you, should you choose to run it.
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Next, the less serious answer as a member of Rote:
"BAWWWWW, I can't take a three-month-old winning meta and copy-paste it into tournaments and collect first prize with no thought." God forbid you actually have to theorycraft for a new environment. Abloobloobloo.
But let's be honest: the only reason you like tinker setups is because it guarantees that you won't fly out of the arena.